Love Of A Lifetime

by Murphy, Riley

  Using her knee, she hit him hard and dead-square between the legs. That did the trick as he grunted and immediately released her. So quickly, in fact, that she fell back a few steps before she recovered.

  Moving fast, she steadied herself and was careful to use these faltering steps to her advantage as she increased the distance between them while checking on his doubled over form. She didn’t want to get too close to the bed—he might get ideas, so she stopped, spun around and readjusted her robe. Tightening the belt around her waist, she flicked her hair behind each shoulder and bravely glared at him. She was ready and waiting for the fight that was to come. But then? As horrible seconds ticked past and he remained bent with both palms on his knees, breathing hard and deep in the pain she’d caused him, worry gripped her. He didn’t appear to be the kind of guy to take something like this well. No—her panic mounted— he was probably the kind of a guy who gave back as good as he got.

  She gulped and looked furtively around at the empty room, realizing for the first time what a disadvantage a sparse room was, with no lamp or vase to wield for protection. Um, yeah, this wasn’t good.

  Then out of the corner of her eye she spied his shadow stretching across the floor as his powerful body unfolded to stand and she was forced to acknowledged with a sinking heart that ‘wasn’t good’ was an understatement. Also, it would’ve taken more than a lamp or vase to hold off the fury she read in his eyes and when he headed straight for her the only thought she had was to run. But she couldn’t.

  He was coming closer. And closer. He was right in front of her. So close she read the steel-like gleam in his eyes that shouted one word, “Mine.”

  Uh oh…

  Chapter Seven

  “Look, Jack,” she emphasized, willing to give up that much of the battle, while she put her hand on his chest in an effort to keep him at bay. “I don’t understand any of this. I’m confused. I feel like there’s something I should know about us. In the image I saw us,” she latched onto the idea, determined to distract him, “why would we be fighting like that?”

  “How the hell should I know?” he shook his head. “We’ve fought about a lot of things over the years.”

  She somehow knew he was being evasive. “Not like this, buddy.” She watched him closely and tried to gauge his reaction. “We were arguing over something that made me hate you. I could feel it. Here,” she told him, as she placed her free hand over her heart. “I still feel it. It’s telling me to leave this place. To leave you.”

  Even though his brows sliced up in a dark and dangerous manner, he grinned, “You’re welcome to try, babe.”

  Why, the arrogant… “Is that a threat?” Her own brows arched, but she didn’t grin as she was dying to see how he intended to get out of the corner she had just pushed him into. No sane guy would admit—

  “Yes.” His gaze never wavered while his huge form loomed large and predatory. Obviously, corners didn’t bother a brute like him. Just her luck.

  “All right,” she sniffed, ready to change tack because she somehow knew she wouldn’t win in the direction the current dialogue was going. “Tell me why—no,” she corrected, stepping around him to go to her chair at the table. Sitting down, she took her time adjusting the robe securely around her before she said, “Convince me to stay. Is there an important reason that I should want to be here with you when everything inside me is screaming that I should leave?”

  He had the gall to slide that grin into a bright smile prior to eyeing the bed.

  That reminder caused a hot zing to sizzle right through until it landed in a mass of tingles between her legs. Damn. “Besides that.”

  “You love me,” he whispered and when he moved to come to her, the corded muscles of his thighs beneath the leather moved temptingly with him like a second skin. It was as distracting as it was irritating.

  “L-love you?” she sputtered. “At the moment I don’t even like you.”

  He’d nearly reached her and then at the last moment, he quickly sidestepped to pick up his toppled chair. One handing it, he swung it up to cartwheel over her head, before he let it slam down in front of her with a bang. When he sat straddling it, his forearms crossed and came to rest on the seat back while he stared. He was so close, too close to her now. If he wanted to, he could have reached his arms out on either side and effectively captured her, as her back and front were sandwiched conveniently between each chair.

  “You like me.”

  “No, I don’t. Really. I can’t help how I feel,” she told him honestly, while she attempted not to squirm under his watchful gaze. “I think I despise you,” she quietly admitted and mentally braced herself for the storm.

  “That’s not what you panted out between those luscious lips earlier, blue eyes. Yes, a short time ago, when you cried and begged. Ummm...” He made this sexy purr low and deep in his throat, adding, “And so fucking hot and wet for me.”

  Unbelievable. Despite hating him. Loathing him. Wishing she were anywhere but here, she was sinking again. Oh, he really was a devil to remind her of all that now, when she was so uncertain about all of this. Uncertain about everything but that one thing—her desire for him. Yes, even now, held hostage by this inexplicable dislike she felt toward him, her heart still raced and her insides thrilled just having him close. It made no sense.

  “What was it, Jack, that made me hate you?” There was that tic again but she didn’t care. She figured she had a right to know, especially when she truly wanted so much to like him, to love him, and get that wonderful contented feeling back in the depths of her heart. “Was it so bad?”

  “You thought so,” he whispered.

  “But you didn’t? Is that why we were fighting?”

  “Yes, no...I don’t know anymore.” He growled and turned away. “This is your journey. I can’t help you with it even if I knew how.”

  Finley examined his proud profile and decide one thing. The guy was a fucking heartbreaker. There wasn’t one feature of his she could find fault with. “If I didn’t know any better I would have said you were the perfect male specimen come to life just for me.” He turned back and the lopsided grin he sported made her toes curl. It also made her curious. “What?”

  “That’s what you said to Shelley. Although, the night the two of you spent commiserating about men with you specifically complaining about me, I don’t think it had the desired effect. When you suggested the perfect male would have to be built, I don’t think you were talking about piece by piece from the grave. But then Mary did have a penchant for the bizarre on occasion.”

  “Mary Shelley, Mary Shelley? I knew Mary Shelley?”

  “Yes. While most believe Byron inspired her famous story I know for a fact it was you.”

  Although Finley would have loved to believe this completely over-the-top tidbit, she was skeptical. “I don’t believe it.”

  He shrugged. “Would you believe that you’re responsible for the lean in The Tower of Pisa?”

  He was quite charming when he wanted to be. Take now for instance. The hate she felt for him was warring with a need she had to like him. It was mystifying. She looked away and mumbled, “No.”

  “True story. You got it into your head that a Roman architect that we met—I don’t even remember his name now—was right about aeration. You spent months talking to the Pisano brothers about it. My belief is that they unwisely took your advice and turned up all the ground under the structure before they started to build.”

  She stared at the fire. Refusing to be drawn into this nonsense. “I don’t believe that either.”

  “Okay, would you believe it if I told you that you were one of the driving forces behind the inception of the women’s suffrage movement?”

  Dammit. She had to turn back. “Now that I believe.”

  They both smiled then and it was nice as a feeling of mutual pride swept between them. Until the longer she stared at him, the closer she came to recalling something. There in the back of her mind. A tendril of mist da
nced and shimmered in her subconscious until a heavy gust of recognition blew it aside and laid bare an image that flashed bright and clear and awful. “You were with another woman.” The stabbing pain of betrayal caused her voice to crack.

  “You thought so.” He didn’t even blink.

  “I thought…I…” She was flabbergasted. She tried to exit from the chair, first to her left and then to her right, but his arms came out to hold her within the space. “What do you mean by that, Jack?” She ignored her imprisoned position for the moment and continued, “Couldn’t we figure it out? I mean, either it’s a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’. Were you with another woman?” She recalled her vision and spat, “The leggy blonde? How utterly original of you.”

  “I have no excuse.” Jack’s heart ached seeing how quickly that admittance turned her furious expression to crestfallen. But this was the truth. How could he explain or make any excuses for what he’d done when he didn’t even know himself? One moment they’d been arguing over Ceil, the blonde that he’d hired to handle acquisitions for him all those years ago, and the next he’d made a grave mistake. “I’m sorry.”

  They’d fought hard that last night and she’d been so adamant about the young woman that he’d gotten mad. Angry that she didn’t trust him. So, unwisely, after they’d argued, he’d left needing some space and did something he’d never done before. He got drunk. So drunk, he’d never found his way home that night. He didn’t remember much of what had happened, only that the next morning when he woke up he was lying in Ceil’s bed, naked and disgusted. He couldn’t recall how he got there, but the worst part was that by the time he did get home to find his mate and tell her how sorry he was, it was too late. “I have no excuse,” he repeated.

  “I don’t recall asking you for one.” He watched her look around the room with new and enlightened eyes. “So what was the plan, Jack? Find me this lifetime and seduce me before I remembered? Make me so hot for you that I’d forgive your betrayal and infidelity?”

  She was obviously expecting him to deny it, therefore her brows rose in modest surprise as he admitted, “It was something like that, yes.”

  She leaned back in her chair, folded her hands primly on her lap, and assured, “It’s not that easy. I wish it were…” She sounded as if she’d left the rest of that thought go unfinished before she twisted in her seat and stared at his forearm looking for an exit.

  “There’s more we need to talk about, blue eyes. I can’t let you go.”

  “I see,” she spoke between tightly drawn lips. “Tell me, Jack, what more could we possibly have to talk about? Aside from your snake-like and totally disgusting antics, that is?”

  He chose to ignore her baiting. “The prophecy.”

  The flames of the fire flared up and furiously licked at the inner walls of the hearth with that pronouncement. He saw her shoot a bewildered look over at the blaze, but made no mention of it as she bit out, “Prophecy, huh?” She turned back and focused speculative eyes on him. “You aren’t going to tell me that this prophecy says something like, we have to stay together, are you?” He let his look convey his answer.

  “How convenient,” she quipped. “What else does this ‘prophecy’ say?”

  Not that it mattered to her. He wouldn’t be getting off the proverbial hook that easily. She wondered how long it had taken him to come up with the idea. To feed her a load of crap about how bad things would happen if she didn’t accept him back into her life? Did he really think she was that stupid? That gullible?

  Well, she was, wasn’t she? She’d almost fallen for him again. Mary Shelley. Leaning Tower of Pisa. Women’s suffrage movement, for fuck’s sake. She needed to stay strong here. Yep, the fact that she still desired him, ached to climb on him and melt in his arms? She was going to have to put that down to rotten luck.

  Jack cleared his throat. “You look worried. Don’t be. I can’t read your thoughts anymore. That ability goes the second I fully taste you.”

  Man, she’d forgotten all about that. “Well, I can’t read yours either. So, are you going to tell me about this ‘prophecy’? Is it a good one? You know, like the world’s going to end, that type of a deal?”

  He blinked, and then grinned. His handsome features wicked and utterly enchanting while his eyes sparkled with predatory interest. “If you could read my thoughts right now, babe, I don’t think you’d be so glib.” He paused as if waiting for that veiled threat to sink in before he continued, “Good, now are you going to listen to what I have to say without ridiculing? I know you’re mad and I’m prepared to deal with your anger, but what I won’t stand for is your sarcasm.”

  She wanted to tell him to piss off, but that would be petty and really not her style. She preferred walking the thin line to step off, okay, admittedly sometimes over it, to jab at a person with piercing barbs. Therefore, she brought her arms up and folded them across her chest while her brows arched high on her forehead in a miffed, ‘go on, I’m listening’, pose.

  And he did after he got up to pace in front of the fire. “The prophecy states that there will be seven children born during certain lifetimes that will work together to unite all the worlds, even the forbidden one. The dates of their conception have been decreed. Five out of the seven have already been birthed. Some of them, many of your lifetimes ago. But this one, the sixth child? It’s ours yet to come.” He abruptly stopped pacing and spun around to face her.

  She silently stared at him while she thought about that information for a moment. She was determined to be reasonable and at least hear him out before she told him to go pound sand. “We’re to conceive this child in this lifetime?” She asked for clarity.

  “Ah...” He looked almost sheepish. His mouth opened as if he was going to speak and then snapped closed. He turned and furiously paced back and forth once more with brisk and decisive movements. Whatever he had to tell her, she was sure she wouldn’t like it. She found herself holding her breath until he stopped short and finally spit it out, “Tonight, actually.”

  “Excuse me?” Her chair rocked when she shot up. “Tonight? How can we guarantee that?” But then another thought hit her. “How—?” And yet another thought struck. “I don’t even like you and now you expected me to do this after—?”

  “I wish there could’ve been more time for you to make your decision. Really I do, but we had only just found you and then I had to formulate a plausible way to get you to the house—”

  “Who’s we and what do you mean by my decision?” Now she took to pacing.

  “Your decision about us.”

  “Us?” She halted. “There is no us. My heart feels nothing for you now. Do you know how terrible that emptiness is when I was just given a small taste of how full it once was?”

  He closed his eyes and turned away, but she didn’t care. Not when he stretched his hands out on the fireplace mantle and gripped it as if he were going to crush it beneath his fingers. Not when he dropped his head as though in defeat, and not when he sighed as if the weight of the world was dragging him down because, somehow, she knew he was desperate enough to make excuses. She waited and when he finally spoke, she was almost disappointed that he didn’t offer her one. “I’m sorry, mia lei. I thought perhaps there was a chance.”

  She stared at his massive back and tried to feel anything. Searching for a place inside her that could accept his apology, but she came up empty. And she knew why as she gauged his carelessness had cost them too much. “A bond has been broken, hasn’t it?”

  He didn’t move. “Yes.”

  “Irreparably?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “What do you know, Jack? Were you aware of the consequences? Did you know that this bond between us, once broken, might never be mended?”

  “Yes,” he said quietly. Honestly, and it cut her to the quick.

  “So, knowing the eventual outcome, you purposely killed what we were to each other by ignoring my warnings about that woman and visiting with her that night anyway?” When she s
aw him stiffen, she added, “Yes, Jack, I remember that much of our past. How could you?”

  “I regret…” he whispered.

  Finley not only heard the pain steeped in those words, she felt it as well and fell completely apart. Her throat ached and her nose burned and soon all she saw was a watery blur of him through her gathering tears. She brushed them aside as each drop steadily skidded down her cheeks. “How could you expect me to—? I gave you half of what makes me who I am. How-how,” she drew in a hiccupped breath, “could this have ha-happened? W-w-why?”

  Jack spun around. He took one step and then stopped. “Promise me, mia lei, no more tears. Please. I can take your anger, but not your sadness. I’d give up my place in this world if I thought it would make things better for you…for us.”

  “Why didn’t you just leave me alone in this lifetime? I never would have known,” she placed a hand over her left breast in real fear that her heart was breaking in two, “but now I feel the pain of your betrayal as fresh and as raw as if it only just happened. Why did you reopen a wound when you know there’s little chance it will ever heal?”

  “We have to try. We must.”

  She took a deep breath and closed her eyes to gain strength and that’s when some kind of ancient knowledge came to her. A whisper that tore her apart. He chose another. Any hope she had vanished and she stated flatly, “If a Vampine male willing chooses another woman over his mate, his mate is destined to walk alone in this world for all eternity.”

  “No.”

  But they both knew truth.

  And with that truth came another. Oh, her heart might have been breaking with an agony she barely understood, but she wasn’t so distracted by it that she didn’t comprehend his motivations. “Wait a minute. I know it now. You need me. You need me to bear your child, right? This was never about me. You wanting me. Or trying to fix things between us. It’s about fulfilling some prophecy, isn’t it?”